Northants Pie

1 hour ago, NottsTastic said:

2-2!!!

Can Notts please learn to defend, it's a joke. We won't win any games with defending like this.

Do you take the same drugs as clifton? 

Obviously our defenders should be keeping a top 6 championship clubs multi million pound strike force out the game as if we were playing Long Eaton United.

12 hours ago, Truefootballfan said:

I Think the only chance we have is if Luton have relaxed after gaining automatic promotion. They were beginning to flag in the last few games so we can only hope they have run out of steam.

A relaxed Luton are more dangerous in my opinion as they have the players to really hurt any team, they miss their fulcrum in Luke Berry though and for me his absence is the reason they didn't win the league

12 hours ago, Truefootballfan said:

I am still puzzled at the poor performance at Grimsby. Surely knowing the importance of that game we should have gone in all guns blazing. If we had lost giving everything then fair enough but to come away with a performance like that was sickening.

One of the lessons KN & RT have to learn (they have developed so much during the season so far) for next season is that football has moved on, you can no longer start the game defending a 0-0 hoping to nick a goal at some point, whilst the tactics have to change to a degree, we are much much better on the front foot, we just don't work very well trying to defend a 0-0.

It was nearly the same at Barnet, the difference being that i don't think i have seen such a piss poor display from Notts for a very long time.

The teams that win leagues rarely dramatically change their tactics, whilst they will try to combat another teams strengths that is hand in hand with their natural way of playing.

At home we normally always look very very dangerous going forward & not bad in defence, away from home has been non-existent going forward and our defence looks like they are the charge of the light brigade soldiers.

2 hours ago, Chris said:

Yeah, but they've done well for us - I don't get this Shola Ameobi witch hunt.

The issue is the fact the club hasn't signed a replacement and refuses to use a very capable forward in Forte, Nolan has some major stubborn issues which I have been pointing out all season. I think we can do well against Accrington but it's all related to how we play, we can't blame the forward and I know @ARLukomski isn't suggesting this but quite a few seem to be.

Just remember that without the options we have, we'd be doing much poorer.

I'm going for a 2-1 away win.

The Shola witch hunt I agree is ridiculous, Forte is never going to be good enough imo, best as a last 25 min sub.

Looking forward to Husin & Walker this afternoon, but wtf is Virtue doing anywhere near a shirt?

Plus you know you're sh1te when the only option you have is Matty Virtue.

John Tompson summed our season up perfectly when he said Chesterfield are playing football and Nott's are just hoofing aimless balls towards Ameobi & Stead....

We got found out mid November and haven't changed it since, unfortunately

21 hours ago, frank lepie said:

Yes, we'll do well if we are still in the playoffs at the end of the season. We did need to strengthen more in the January window but we've been unfortunate with the loss of the Derby lad who would have brought an new attacking dimension.

Having said that we had some things go in our favour in the autumn where we scrambled a result or two, so I don't think this team was going to maintain second position. Nolan has done a great job getting us to this point, and he's done it by getting the best out of lads who were previously performing poorly so we don't want to lose that factor but we clearly will need to strengthen more in the summer so we can really go for an automatic next season. Stead, Ameobi and Smith have been great players but expecting them to provide what's needed up front, week by week, was a big ask which they are struggling to deliver consistently. Forte will score the odd goal but he doesn't contribute nearly enough in his all round game to deserve a starting place. So I suggest we need to lose at least one of the senior lads and Forte in the summer and bring three strikers in. Ikpeazu would be a start.

 

Ikpeazu is out of contract in the summer, I think we could do far worse than sign him, all we then need is a smaller more skillful / quick goalscorer and we'll be a match for anyone up top.

Personally I'd like to see Jorge play alongside a lad like Ikpeazu, he can drift about dragging defenders into positions they don't want to go and his ability and touch would be better used up top imo.

We'll be outside the playoff positions come the start of March, it was good while it lasted but we were never going to stay up there unless we strengthened sufficiently and we haven't, not blaming anyone just the cold hard facts.

Hopefully Nolan will learn that you have to be ruthless to get anywhere and if you look back to the end of last season he had the perfect chance to clear the decks but felt an affection towards players who had kept us up.

Wouldn't mind seeing Ikpeazu in the black & white stripes next season 

I think we should just settle for the mid table finish that we are hurtling towards.

Dissapointing given our start to the season but we were found out around the end of November and have only managed to get worse since.

This squad nearly got relegated for a reason, we need another relatively large scale squad change in the summer to ensure we get a more dynamic defense and a more dynamic front line

No worries buddy

15 minutes ago, liampie said:

i dont think we should overreact we only lost 1-0.

i do think the players need to improve and kn needs to accept his part in this. people have said that he does not change things and theres no accountability during games, first half sounded dire but kn waits until half time to try and address it? i just think its disappointing.

we have the ability to gain promotion and the inner fighting is leading to the instability imo. 

He didn't wait till half time mate, no player gave a toss yesterday, its as simple as that

For those that had the fortune of not going, not only did you miss a performance worse than Swansea you also missed the quite frankly moronic few in our crowd, honestly some people need to get a proper understanding of football before they start opening their gobs, one particular Woman whom I moved away from as she was driving me to distraction.

Ratings 

Collin 5,

Jones 5 

Brisley 5

Duffy 4

Tootle 5

Grant 7 At least he tried to get us going 

Milsom 4

Husin 4

Hwakridge 4

Forte 5

Ameobi 5

Noble 6

Walker 4

Bennet n/a

As a team 1, we looked like a bunch of strangers to scared to get wet & muddy, at least when Noble came on he snapped into a couple of challenges, missed Jon Stead massively.

We have been well & truly found out, teams know we have absolutely no pace and play far to rigidly.

The referee -10, booked our players for anything and let them get away with numerous bad and dangerous tackles. Then to top it all off let them take an offside from 10 yards in OUR half!!

Absolutely sh1te all over, from management ro players

Its wet & windy and it doesnt look like the biggest crowd from either side but COYP!!

Anyone know about parking down there?

@Dan ??

Went to the old round a few times, never been to this one

Going to the game tomorrow with the little lad, first time in a while I've been & will be able to go to most games in a month.

Barnet need to win desperately so I think their style will suit us tomorrow, hopefully Tuesday's performance will be banished by a return to the Crewe last 80 minutes performance.

Will keep this thread updated at half & full time

Fitzsimmons, Tootle, Brisley, Hall, Jones, Hawkridge, Husin, Noble / Hewitt (depends on illness), Grant, Ameobi, Bennett.

I've left Jon Stead & Richard Duffy out purely to give him a rest before the Crawley game.

I have no faith that Fitzsimmons will play but for me he's the better keeper and also Collin doesn't look properly fit yet.

It was a not bad attacking performance, likewise a not bad defensive peformance, being critical we need to release Jorge Grant earlier, countless times he had made brilliant runs on the left wing and every time the ball seemed to fall to either Hewitt or Hunt, neither of whom have the awareness to see such a pass.

Hewitts energy is faultless, his positional sense though needs to be better, especially when defending, but as a team I didn't think we defended that well, mainly caused by this lack of awareness as other players were being dragged nto areas they shouldn't have been in.

We miss Tootle as both he & Jones push the opposing team backwards but with only Jones doing this Crewe's left winger was cheating which allowed them an out ball most of the time.

Our ball watching at times is criminal and you could see Crewe trying to expose this whenever they had a chance.

Having said that going forward, Ameobi was class, his first touch is brilliant and the referee failed to spot a lot of fouls commited on him yesterday. Stead ran his nuts off as always, like with Ameobi the Crewe defenders were all over him like a rash, looked better once Bennett came on and took over the running.

Alessandra will always give you an out ball but we miss Hawkridge in that position. Husin was class, always has time and has the ability to find time, a lone undermined skill that the best always posses.

Grant got far more into the game once Bennet came on as he had someone on the same wavelength as him and these both helped Husin also as he was understanding the runs they made.

If we could clear up the defensive mistakes then we'd beat any team we come up against in my opinion.

Just depends on how Wycombe set up to play as everyone in the league knows how we play, keep the ball on the deck against us and we're in trouble like Coventry showed, we are always going to bypass the midfield with lumps upto the old men hoping for a mistake from the opposition and with Dan Jones going wandering constantly their right winger will have a field day.

With this in mind I'm going for a Wycombe win 3-1.

58 minutes ago, Super_Danny_Allsopp said:

I think if the ref donned a Notts' shirt and played for us we would still have lost.

He certainly couldn't have been any worse than Jones.

If he starts again, even ahead of Mavis the tea lady then we are going to have a long long winter.

Because of our recent past it won't take too many more of those performances for the crowds to drop to pre-Hardy levels.

In general I feel for Nolan as his nice guy attitude has seen him sign last seasons donkeys and his mates son's all because he can't tell someone to do one.

Trying not to be too cynical but if they (being the management team) sat up late all week planning to just hoof the ball into the stratosphere bypassing the midfield then January will have a familiar feel to the last few years.

The team talk must have been all of 5 seconds long, right lads just ******* hoof it and see what happens. When defending try marking space...

Its going to be a long season if thats how we intend to approach games.

By the sound of it our left back should have been left back in Nottingham.

A poor poor first game with yet again a poor plan A and absolutely no other plan.

2 hours ago, Elite_pie said:

My prediction for Nolan's starting XI is:

Collin

Tootle, Duffy, Brisley, Jones

Milsom, Hewitt, Walker, Allessandra

Grant

Ameobi

Very difficult for a score prediction this early, but I'll go for 1-1 with 1,225 Notts fans in attendance.

The only change I'd make to that is Hawkridge for Hewitt

Rob Milsom should have taken the penalty, great left foot.

Hopefully he'll get the next one